This article is part of the People’s World 100th Anniversary Series.
October 1, 2024, marks the 75th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. The establishment of a socialist government in China came after years of resistance against feudal rule, foreign colonialism, Japanese imperialism and occupation, and right-wing Kuomintang forces—all led by the Communist Party of China.
The following message hailing the founding of the People’s Republic was dispatched to Mao Zedong via telegram on behalf of the National Committee of the Communist Party USA by William Z. Foster, national chairman, and Eugene Dennis, general secretary. It was printed in the Daily Worker on Oct. 4, 1949.
Sent against the backdrop of the emerging Cold War, the message emphasizes the need for peace and economic cooperation between China and the U.S. and opposes the kind of confrontational approach that Wall Street was pushing the government to pursue toward the Soviet Union and the new socialist countries of eastern Europe.
In a short time, U.S. imperialism would be at war in Korea. It eventually pulled China into the conflict. Decades would pass before U.S.-China relations were normalized. Today, a new Cold War is being fomented in Washington, with barriers going up to block China’s trade and development and military alliances being used to encircle the country.
Just as Foster and Dennis said in 1949, world peace requires a relationship of equality and cooperation between the U.S. and China.
Note: In this reprinted article, some spellings of transliterated Chinese names have been updated to match current practice.
Foster, Dennis Hail New China
By William Z. Foster and Eugene Dennis
Daily Worker, Oct. 4, 1949
To: Mao Zedong
Chairman, People’s Republic of China
Beijing, China
We hail the formation of the Central Government of the People’s Republic of China. This is an historic and glorious event which heralds the close of a century of imperialist domination, and especially the defeat of Wall Street’s criminal policy of reactionary intervention in the internal affairs of the great Chinese people.
This marks the emancipation of nearly one-fourth of humanity from the chains of feudalism and colonialism and advances the national liberation struggles of the colonial peoples everywhere. This places liberated China in a major position in the ranks of the new people’s democracies and on the firm path of social progress and the eventual realization of socialism.
This great achievement—attained under the leadership of the Communist Party and the heroic liberation armies it leads—is one of the great events in human history. It is certainly one of the most significant world events since the epochal October Socialist Revolution, the consolidation and triumph of which paved the way for China’s liberation.
By your victories, the world camp of peace, democracy, and socialism has been immeasurably strengthened. The camp of imperialism, reaction, and atomic war—headed by Wall Street—has been considerably weakened and undermined.
The formation of the Central Government of the People’s Republic of China isolates even further and renders more impotent Wall Street’s servile Chinese puppets, its reactionary and treacherous Chiang Kai-shek and other Kuomintang agents in the United States and the United Nations. It reinforces the peace-loving forces in the USA and the world who are resisting and opposing ever more effectively the shameful warmongering policies of Wall Street’s bipartisan imperialist government.
You may be confident that the majority of the American people rejoice at your triumph. They will oppose all attempts of the imperialists to violate China’s national sovereignty or to obstruct the building of the New People’s China. They vigorously oppose the ruinous policies of the Pentagon and State Department. They also see the need to establish close and friendly relations with the New China as an important means to alleviate for the American masses the chaos and suffering of the developing economic crisis.
They are joining a mighty demand for the opening of large-scale commercial relations with China on a basis of equality and for the early establishment of diplomatic relations with your new government.
Progressive Americans hail the liberation of China and recognize the immense contribution it makes to world peace and democracy. We Communists and militant workers pay special tribute to the heroism, fidelity, and leading role of the Communist Party of China and take pride in yet another historic proof of the validity of the science of Marxism-Leninism.
In the name of our Communist Party, in the name of the 11 Communist leaders now on trial in Foley Square for opposing Wall Street’s imperialist drive toward world domination, war, and fascism, we greet you, Comrade Mao, for your brilliant and steadfast leadership.
We greet your colleagues who alongside of you head the new People’s Government. Through you, we offer our congratulations, our warm friendship, and our solidarity to the Chinese people. We extend the most fervent wishes for the speedy consolidation, peace, and prosperity, and for the ever-victorious progress of the great People’s Republic of China.
National Committee of the CPUSA
William Z. Foster, National Chairman
Eugene Dennis, General Secretary.
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